No way to prove that guns would do that. Our culture is radically different form every example you have to draw from. Our populous has a morbid fascination with murder, death, and outright torture, just look at the TV shows and movies that Hollywood sells. As crappy as the movies are, we now have Saw 4.... really?

I promise, you take away arms, there will be 11,000 homicides with knives, take knives away, it will be hammers, take those away, it will be vehicular homicides, all in the same numbers, promise. I haven't found one law enforcement officer that works in the USA to disagree with me yet._________________"It's ok, they might have guns but we have flowers." - Perpetual Victim

No way to prove that guns would do that. Our culture is radically different form every example you have to draw from. Our populous has a morbid fascination with murder, death, and outright torture, just look at the TV shows and movies that Hollywood sells. As crappy as the movies are, we now have Saw 4.... really?

I promise, you take away arms, there will be 11,000 homicides with knives, take knives away, it will be hammers, take those away, it will be vehicular homicides, all in the same numbers, promise. I haven't found one law enforcement officer that works in the USA to disagree with me yet.

you asked what I prefer, not what I predict.

Indeed, you do have a fascination with violence. I LOVE violent stuff (although, it is mainly tv). My favourite drama in recent years have been the sopranos, the wire and breaking bad. It's pretty violent, though I am told that's tame compared to video games and things like Saw (which I haven't seen). I guess I only really go for violence if it is meaningful and relevant, not just gratuitous.

This man here, Tyree Carter, you would make laws that say he can't have a gun (and he'd have one anyway), and then pat yourself on the back for having made the world a better place. Then when he shot this baby, you'd say, "See! This is why we must take guns away!". Then you'd go home and beat your meat, feeling like you had proved your case.

Instead, I say we find out why Tyree did this, and address those problems, and stop letting the authoritarian collectivists con us into believing that taking guns away from law-abiding citizens is going to prevent such things.

would he though? In britain we have a very high number of stabbings, and a lot less murders. It's much harder to get a gun, so people use knives.

Glad to see you have solved your violence problem and feel like telling everybody else how to do things right.

More anecdotal evidence. You're also the most violent state in Europe.

This man here, Tyree Carter, you would make laws that say he can't have a gun (and he'd have one anyway), and then pat yourself on the back for having made the world a better place. Then when he shot this baby, you'd say, "See! This is why we must take guns away!". Then you'd go home and beat your meat, feeling like you had proved your case.

Instead, I say we find out why Tyree did this, and address those problems, and stop letting the authoritarian collectivists con us into believing that taking guns away from law-abiding citizens is going to prevent such things.

would he though? In britain we have a very high number of stabbings, and a lot less murders. It's much harder to get a gun, so people use knives.

Glad to see you have solved your violence problem and feel like telling everybody else how to do things right.

More anecdotal evidence. You're also the most violent state in Europe.

Harder to kill with a knife? Nonsense. A knife has a much wider surface area (increasing the likelihood of damage to vital vessels and nerves) and can penetrate just as deep. Not to mention that a gun can't slit your throat open. Frankly, appealing to medieval tools and policies to prevent homicides is retarded. Without enacting policies which cure the social conditions which promote criminality all you've done is disarm the law-abiding and left them at the mercy of the criminal element you refuse to address._________________

juniper wrote:

you experience political reality dilation when travelling at american political speeds. it's in einstein's formulas. it's not their fault.

Harder to kill with a knife? Nonsense. A knife has a much wider surface area (increasing the likelihood of damage to vital vessels and nerves) and can penetrate just as deep. Not to mention that a gun can't slit your throat open. Frankly, appealing to medieval tools and policies to prevent homicides is retarded. Without enacting policies which cure the social conditions which promote criminality all you've done is disarm the law-abiding and left them at the mercy of the criminal element you refuse to address.

I love you aidan, and I want to have your babies. _________________People Of Love

Harder to kill with a knife? Nonsense. A knife has a much wider surface area (increasing the likelihood of damage to vital vessels and nerves) and can penetrate just as deep. Not to mention that a gun can't slit your throat open. Frankly, appealing to medieval tools and policies to prevent homicides is retarded. Without enacting policies which cure the social conditions which promote criminality all you've done is disarm the law-abiding and left them at the mercy of the criminal element you refuse to address.

what is it with all these irrelevant details of knife width? My desktop has a wider surface area than a knife, yet it has killed no one.

The free market (PBUH) has already decided which of a knife and gun is more lethal. We don't go into battle with knives (despite their large surface area), killers in chicago overwhelming use guns (despite how difficult it is to slit open a throat with one), and drive by knifings are quite the rarity (despite being rather sharp and easy to throw). Who knows why the gun is the killing instrument of choice despite the overwhelming superiority of various properties of a knife. But soldiers, murders and home defenders have spoken; the gun is better at killing.

Clearly, I just need to make some kind of keyboard macro so that with the hit of a key I can post "goddammit yes, let's also tackle the underlying causes of crime."

You don't care about the underlying causes; you haven't even talked about them other than to dismiss them with a hand wave. You just want to take away guns because that's the thinking you've been programmed with.

You don't care about the underlying causes; you haven't even talked about them other than to dismiss them with a hand wave. You just want to take away guns because that's the thinking you've been programmed with.

I don't like to hijack threads. If you would like to discuss these issues start a new thread.

"He asked me for money and I said I didn't have it," Sherry West, the boy’s mom, told The Associated Press Friday from her apartment, which was scattered with her son's toys and movies. "When you have a baby, you spend all your money on babies. They're expensive. And he kept asking and I just said `I don't have it.' And he said, `Do you want me to kill your baby?' And I said, `No, don't kill my baby!"'

One of the teens allegedly fired four shots, grazing West's ear and striking her in the leg, before he walked around to the stroller and shot the baby in the face.

A pair of teenagers was arrested Friday in the most recent shooting. West had just been to the post office a few blocks from her apartment Thursday morning and was pushing her son, Antonio, in his stroller while they walked past gnarled oak trees and blooming azaleas in the coastal city of Brunswick.

Seventeen-year-old De'Marquis Elkins is charged as an adult with first-degree murder, along with a 14-year-old who was not identified because he is a juvenile, Police Chief Tobe Green said. It wasn't immediately clear whether the boys had attorneys.

"He asked me for money and I said I didn't have it," Sherry West, the boy’s mom, told The Associated Press Friday from her apartment, which was scattered with her son's toys and movies. "When you have a baby, you spend all your money on babies. They're expensive. And he kept asking and I just said `I don't have it.' And he said, `Do you want me to kill your baby?' And I said, `No, don't kill my baby!"'

One of the teens allegedly fired four shots, grazing West's ear and striking her in the leg, before he walked around to the stroller and shot the baby in the face.

A pair of teenagers was arrested Friday in the most recent shooting. West had just been to the post office a few blocks from her apartment Thursday morning and was pushing her son, Antonio, in his stroller while they walked past gnarled oak trees and blooming azaleas in the coastal city of Brunswick.

Seventeen-year-old De'Marquis Elkins is charged as an adult with first-degree murder, along with a 14-year-old who was not identified because he is a juvenile, Police Chief Tobe Green said. It wasn't immediately clear whether the boys had attorneys.

Jesus Christ... she lost another son too. By stabbing no less. Without going political, I feel really sorry for her._________________"It's ok, they might have guns but we have flowers." - Perpetual Victim

My desktop has a wider surface area than a knife, yet it has killed no one.

And just like the millions upon millions of guns in the US that will never be fired in anger, your desktop lacks motive. What if their owners used them as intended? The source of Global Warming could be eliminated in a matter of minutes.

More anecdotal evidence. You're also the most violent state in Europe.

not by murder rate.

I predict spanish, greece, italy, and irish crime to go up

what are europeans supposed to do with when the EU parliament, or local national governments literally seize money out of bank accounts to pay for debts?

in the US, if the federal government said they were about to rob you of your life savings like this, you'd at least have a gun to bump back.

Various things. I don't think it is going to come to a gun slinging match either in Europe of the US. If the anger is enough, they will get voted out. Guns just aren't the answer. Your govt stole your money via QE, and I didn't see any gun fights then.

What is probably likely is that the ECB will QE, despite what the germans want.

The difference is that there is serious talk of the UK dropping out of the EU, and of Scotland dropping out of the UK, while in the U.S., if there's serious talk of secession, it's mcgruff's (msnbc's/White House's) "insurrectionism" which the Federal Government would indeed use force to prevent (and has done so in the past, causing about three-quarters of a million deaths not even counting civilians).

So you can't really draw parallels between might cause "gun slinging" in the EU and US. You guys might be well advised to take some lessons learned from U.S. history, unless you welcome being in a similar situation (for example, where the EU sends a million troops to "preserve the Union" and put down a "rebellion" of the Western States when they try to secede over heavy centralized taxation and redistributive policy).

The difference is that there is serious talk of the UK dropping out of the EU, and of Scotland dropping out of the UK, while in the U.S., if there's serious talk of secession, it's mcgruff's (msnbc's/White House's) "insurrectionism" which the Federal Government would indeed use force to prevent (and has done so in the past, causing about three-quarters of a million deaths not even counting civilians).

So you can't really draw parallels between might cause "gun slinging" in the EU and US. You guys might be well advised to take some lessons learned from U.S. history, unless you welcome being in a similar situation (for example, where the EU sends a million troops to "preserve the Union" and put down a "rebellion" of the Western States when they try to secede over heavy centralized taxation and redistributive policy).

Or, Or, Or, you might well be advised to take some lessons from other countries. Quebec has thus far had relatively peaceful secession attempts. Canada I am sure would have respected the outcome of any clear secession vote (although the legal basis is different. Quebec still hasn't signed the Canadian constitution. So what does secession mean?). In any case, guns guns guns aren't the answer. As I have said, I don't think anyone is worried about an invasion from the Canadian govt, especially Quebec. It wouldn't happen. Ontario wouldn't support it, Alberta wouldn't, no one would, because it is thought that war and violence is bad.

Most Canadians are a bunch of pussies except out in the back country. If Nazis or Stalinists got control, they could just go around eliminating who they wanted to as though clubbing baby seals. The main reason this cultural deficiency hasn't already led to the destruction of Canada (e.g., being subsumed by USSR) is Canada's protection by the U.S.

Canada is insignificant and not a model the EU or US can draw useful lessons from. Canada is a side effect.

You'd be one of the first people in line, with your wife and kids in tow, to dutifully and trustingly get on the boxcars bound for the extermination camps. You might want to give that some thought now that you live in Europe, where that happened so recently that witnesses are still alive and where a growing number of people are pushing for Sharia law. When you get to the camps, you can frown on things.

Most Canadians are a bunch of pussies except out in the back country. If Nazis or Stalinists got control, they could just go around eliminating who they wanted to as though clubbing baby seals. The main reason this cultural deficiency hasn't already led to the destruction of Canada (e.g., being subsumed by USSR) is Canada's protection by the U.S.

pussies as opposed to gun slinging shoot first think later rednecks?

Quote:

Canada is insignificant and not a model the EU or US can draw useful lessons from. Canada is a side effect.

it is insignificant in some ways, but not others. Take note of the Scottish referendum. This will go peacefully, unlike in freedomland.

Quote:

You'd be one of the first people in line, with your wife and kids in tow, to dutifully and trustingly get on the boxcars bound for the extermination camps. You might want to give that some thought now that you live in Europe, where that happened so recently that witnesses are still alive and where a growing number of people are pushing for Sharia law. When you get to the camps, you can frown on things.

Not sure what the basis of that is. I oppose sharia law.

Oddly, I would never support a govt that proposes to arm itself, for the very reason you give. I think I stand a better chance against the canadian govt with a hockey stick then you do with your gun rack against your govt.

You see? It just gives a false sense of security, your gun. Nothing based in any kind of reality.

Most Canadians are a bunch of pussies except out in the back country. If Nazis or Stalinists got control, they could just go around eliminating who they wanted to as though clubbing baby seals. The main reason this cultural deficiency hasn't already led to the destruction of Canada (e.g., being subsumed by USSR) is Canada's protection by the U.S.

pussies as opposed to gun slinging shoot first think later rednecks?

That is an inaccurate description of the perpetrators of most gun violence in the US._________________The further a society drifts from truth, the more it will hate those who speak it.
George Orwell

Many have speculated that is the case, and hell, it may turn out that way.

We do know that mother lost another child to violence in a drug related fight in NJ/US.
We also know that she lost costody of a daughter when that child was 8 (now in her 20s).
We know that the daughter expressed doubts about the story, and mentioned an insurance angle.
We know that the father of the 13 month old was breifly jailed for his rage at the mother for pushing a stroller down a street with two public housing units on that street, and blames the mother.
We know that the aunt of the 14 yr old arrested turned in both of the arrested alleged offenders.
We know that while the alleged shooter's mother and aunt alibied him, they were later arrested for making false statements, and subsequently, based on interviews and leads developed from that arrest a firearm was recovered.

I am enjoying the difference in how this case is handled in the media, and teh Ineterwebs compared with the Zimmerman/Martin case in FL/US.

Most Canadians are a bunch of pussies except out in the back country. If Nazis or Stalinists got control, they could just go around eliminating who they wanted to as though clubbing baby seals. The main reason this cultural deficiency hasn't already led to the destruction of Canada (e.g., being subsumed by USSR) is Canada's protection by the U.S.

pussies as opposed to gun slinging shoot first think later rednecks?

That is an inaccurate description of the perpetrators of most gun violence in the US.

It's typically bigoted blurtosis from the brainwashed. And despite all the denials and lip service, her remains fixated on firearms, because he knows his place, and properly obedient little plebian serfs don't bear arms.

Most Canadians are a bunch of pussies except out in the back country. If Nazis or Stalinists got control, they could just go around eliminating who they wanted to as though clubbing baby seals. The main reason this cultural deficiency hasn't already led to the destruction of Canada (e.g., being subsumed by USSR) is Canada's protection by the U.S.

pussies as opposed to gun slinging shoot first think later rednecks?

That is an inaccurate description of the perpetrators of most gun violence in the US.

I know. Calling all canadians pussies probably falls into that as well, no? just a little tit for tat mud slinging.